The National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute (NHLBI) awarded $246,000 to the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF) under the Cardiovascular Diseases Research program (CFDA 93.837) on July 6, 2026, with a completion date of June 30, 2028. This R21 resubmission leverages UCSF's existing Ventricular Tachycardia (VT) Database—a comprehensive, expertly annotated dataset encompassing 5,679 consecutive intensive care unit (ICU) patients with 572,574 hours of physiologic monitoring and 14,304 documented true ventricular tachycardia events. The award funds research to calculate VT burden metrics and assess their impact on patient outcomes by characterizing VT features (including duration, heart rate, and event frequency) to enhance hospital-based electrocardiographic monitoring systems and improve identification of ICU patients at elevated risk of mortality.
The project deliverables include development of precision-based VT burden metrics that will advance upon the previously developed UCSF VT algorithm, which significantly outperformed standard monitoring systems (reducing false positives from 90% in existing algorithms). The transdisciplinary research team comprises experts from UCSF's Division of Hospital Medicine, School of Nursing, and Division of Cardiology's Center for Biosignal Research. By analyzing this uniquely large human-annotated database, the research aims to provide clinically actionable insights that differentiate VT burden characteristics associated with adverse outcomes, thereby supporting more accurate clinical decision-making and risk stratification in acute care settings.